Well, Duh! The Disappointing Thing About The JK Rowling Mess

Rowling mentions that she has “deep concerns about the effect the trans rights movement is having” on her charitable foundations directed toward children and women. She also mentions that she’s concerned about what’s happening to free speech.
on Jul 13, 2020 · 50 comments

You may be aware that J. K. Rowling is in some hot water with the left side of western culture. Over a month ago she made an effort to reclaim the term “women” to refer to biological women, excluding transgender men who have adopted the persona of a women.

Likely that very explanation comes across as “offensive” to the transgender community. But it is what it is. Rowling thinks “men” in the guise of transgender women are hijacking the feminist cause.

After her initial tweet that started the kerfuffle, she doubled down by writing an essay to explain her thinking.

Included in her cogent article, Rowling mentions that she has “deep concerns about the effect the trans rights movement is having” on her charitable foundations directed toward children and women.

She also mentions that she’s concerned about what’s happening to free speech.

There’s a lot more, but needless to say, she’s received quite the backlash. The leftist side of the culture quickly came to the “defense” of the transgender community, as if Rowling had attacked them. She did not. More than once she made it clear that her concerns were not meant to deny the experiences of individuals.

Of course, she doesn’t include God in her thoughts or reasons for her position. Just the things she learned from doing some research.

So in many ways, Rowling’s essay is filled with facts, data, personal experience, and a logical approach consistent with her staunch feminist beliefs.

But the backlash.

I guess she’s received a lot of supportive mail, but also much that is hateful, via Twitter and other sources. The stars of the Harry Potter movie series spoke out to support the transgender community. Many have burned her books.

Most recently she signed a letter that spoke against the “cancel culture” thought that seems to stand against free speech. Some 150 other writers and thinkers signed the letter also, but some are now backtracking and apologizing because they didn’t know who all else would be signing. I don’t know if they had Rowling specifically in mind or not.

Even Stephen King has come out against what Rowling said. The media monitoring organization slanted toward LGBTQ issues said Rowling “has now aligned herself with an anti-science ideology . . .”

A friend of mine recently said, The left eat their own, meaning that those in their camp who don’t go far enough to the extreme are painted as enemies. Of course, the right does the same thing, but in this case, Rowling, who is an extreme feminist, sympathetic to transgender issues, is “the enemy” because she has thought out her position and holds consistently to feminist values.

The sad and disappointing thing about this mess is that it will now be harder for Rowling to publish her books and to get movie deals to turn her stories into great films. Maybe.

Thinking back to the beginning of the Harry Potter series, I realize those books were steeped in controversy. But the kickback came from people identifying as Christians. Not much clout in the publishing industry or in the film industry or in media in general. In some ways the stand against books about a boy wizard increased their visibility and their sales.

Will that happen now? Or, more likely, I’m afraid, will the publishing industry and all that’s tied to it take a step back from Rowling and her stories?

Up to this point, I’ve loved her stories. They are fun and interesting and rich in detail and imagination. And they include some thought-provoking content. They are not perfect, but I would be very, very sad if Rowling “gets cancelled.”

Of course, if that does happen, it would prove her point about freedom of speech.

Best known for her aspirations as an epic fantasy author, Becky is the sole remaining founding member of Speculative Faith. Besides contributing weekly articles here, she blogs Monday through Friday at A Christian Worldview of Fiction. She works as a freelance writer and editor and posts writing tips as well as information about her editing services at Rewrite, Reword, Rework.
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  1. The uproar is garbage.

    • IMO it’s a bunch of losers craving attention so desperately they’ll do anything for 10 seconds of fame. And the best way to show off how Extra Special you are (they think) is to rip apart a hugely successful person. Envy plays a huge role.

      • Bobbles says:

        I think they know what they’re doing. Cancel Culture is as authoritarian as you get, and it’s all connected to Critical Race Theory, which is pushing toward a Communist state (they’re vocal about it). It’s about politics, not racism. It’s about politics, not protecting rights. And politics is a garbage dead end. They’re literally voting to repeal Civil Rights in California right now because… Critical Race Theory. https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_16,_Repeal_Proposition_209_Affirmative_Action_Amendment_(2020) Critical Race Theory literally argues FOR division, segregation, and discrimination against the majority. But the only way to enforce that is high gov. You can’t push the majority out of positions of power when you’re working in a democratic republic. Hence : riots.

        • notleia says:

          For those of you interested in the liberal rationale behind such a move instead of just scaremongering about communism, Imma ‘splain to the best of my understanding of it.
          This is obviously to strengthen Affirmative Action, because the system as it is assumes all candidates have had equal opportunities to gain their qualifications, which is frankly not true. (That’s aside from the issue of corporations being unwilling to pay money to train less-educated or -experienced peeps, which is also crap for other reasons.)
          White peeps are more likely to be well-educated because white peeps are more likely to have money than POC. With few exceptions, wealth is a generational thing, built up by homeownership denied to a lot of POC grands and great-grands because of redlining and suchlike.
          Maybe some upper-class twit has an Ivy League diploma (that does not actually make them as smart as they think they are) because their parents were educated and got high-paying jobs because their parents did the much the same because Polish immigrant great-granddad could afford a house (when unions were strong and he was paid a living wage) that appreciated in value, which was passed down the family line in inheritance.
          I think it’s a worthwhile goal, but IDK if this is the best method to accomplish it with. Personally I would prefer UBI for people making under $75,000 or so, school funding not based on property values, and free college, but that would take muuuuch longer to get results.

          • Brennan McPherson says:

            I read the loooong page there, and I get the rationale. It’s just super naïve, and will only do damage to the progress that’s been made. It literally legalizes discrimination. No one can convince me that will result in a net positive for anyone.

  2. Colleen Snyder says:

    I would be very, very sad if Rowling “gets cancelled.”
    Of course, if that does happen, it would prove her point about freedom of speech.
    I think her point has already been proven. It is a dark day when voices are silenced because they don’t espouse the current political verbiage. Left or Right, they’re all wrong….

  3. Don’t worry. She’ll still have her fan base. Most members of the Twitter mob don’t read books anyhow. No lost book sales there.
    Many are standing up for her.

  4. Steve Smith says:

    I’ve been so angry at things like this that I’ll probably need to go on a serious news fast.

  5. Victoria says:

    What’s the disappointing thing about this mess? Everyone is acting predictably. Good for Ms. Rowling, for standing up and speaking her mind cogently. Of course she will meet criticism, free speech is now an endangered species.

  6. Jay Lowder says:

    Spot on, Rebecca. When someone like Rowling is crying foul to the left and Cancel Culture, you know it’s bad. I fear stories like hers will only increase as McCarthysim gains speed.

  7. Esteria says:

    I’m glad that there are Christians and non-Christians who will speak up, and I pray, J.K.Rowling won’t cave under the pressure. Even more, I pray that she’ll find the Creator through it.

  8. I have a suspicion that J.K. Rowling is too big to be “canceled.” At least I hope so. (Although how you would go about cancelling 500 million books already sold in 80 languages is unclear to me.)

    I was encouraged to read this article a couple weeks ago: “Hachette UK book staff told they are not allowed to boycott author over trans row” (https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/jk-rowling-hachette-book-staff-employees-boycott-trans-row-a9570436.html)

    The publisher said:

    Freedom of speech is the cornerstone of publishing. We fundamentally believe that everyone has the right to express their own thoughts and beliefs. That’s why we never comment on our authors’ personal views and we respect our employees’ right to hold a different view.

    We will never make our employees work on a book whose content they find upsetting for personal reasons, but we draw a distinction between that and refusing to work on a book because they disagree with an author’s views outside their writing, which runs contrary to our belief in free speech.

  9. L.A. Smith says:

    I do believe that JK Rowling will survive this. And good for her for being willing to state what she did. I mean, she didn’t have to. It’s good to have a prominent voice express concerns over where all this is leading…and she’s right. Logically it leads to the clawing back of equal rights that women have been fighting for for decades. The concerning thing to me is the effect of all this on other authors, who are (I suspect) increasingly either giving up writing all together in fear of not saying the “right” thing and the mob turning their spotlight on them, or only writing explicitly PC books.

  10. notleia says:

    Are y’all serious? This isn’t about free speech, this is the free market in action. Rowling hasn’t been jailed or fined or even kicked off Twitter.
    A lot of people have decided that they will no longer support Rowling because they think she’s an asshole. They are exercising their free speech to try to convince lots of people of this opinion.
    Bonus Slacktivist link: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2020/07/09/canceled-disgraced/

    • Brennan McPherson says:

      You’re saying it’s the free market in action to try to destroy people’s jobs, creative projects, ability to speak their opinion in perfectly lawful ways, etc.? Didn’t you complain about people being banned from this comment section not that long ago? How’s that not the free market in action? How about if someone made your employer fire you because you think it’s fine that people get canceled for disagreeing with your world view?

      • notleia says:

        Bruh, don’t pretend Rowling is some helpless nobody with no resources. She’s got more money than all us in the commbox combined. It’s hardly harming someone when they only make millions instead of billions.
        It’s kind of a pity she’s doubled down on her TERFy crap, because she was pretty okay about social welfare. She’s donated a lot of money, hopefully most of which to actually worthwhile causes.
        Nobody is entitled to a multimillion career. Rowling is still free to create, but nobody is obligated to buy it. And bruh, it’s not like she’s being shamed over having an opinion about whether hot dogs can be considered a sandwich. She’s being shamed over her opinions on the treatment of fellow human beings doing things not proven to be harmful.
        But Spec Faith could totally get rid of me if they were willing to commit to it. They could ban me, possibly others, as being “too liberal,” but it would be smarter to make a list of rules so they don’t look like arbitrary, petty shits. But then arguing over the rules would take FOREVER and still possibly alienate some of their target audience if they favor certain denominational tidbits over others, ie Calvinism vs Wesleyism. And if Christians could agree on what was necessary to the faith, there wouldn’t be a porpskillion denominations even just on the conservative end of the pool.

        • It would happen to some poor peasant, as well, and does (often). You also didn’t answer my question. What if they wanted to cancel you because you disagreed with their worldview? And how is it any different from what’s happening to her? In addition, how is her saying that biological sex is real an example of her being an “a-hole”? You say it’s hardly harming someone by taking away millions of dollars from them. Well, it’s even more hardly harming someone by saying “biological sex is real.” And in the case of larger cancel culture, it’s massively harming someone by trying to destroy their career and family. Boycotting is one thing (I’ve always thought boycotting was stupid, by the way). How is going after destroying a career, spamming death threats and harassment, the same in your mind?

          • notleia says:

            When fundagelicals say “biological sex” they usually mean chromosomes, but the reality is more complicated than that, e.g. androgen insensitivity syndrome. That would indicate that hormones are more important than chromosomes. And hormones can be manipulated. Capacity to produce children is honestly pretty irrelevant on a societal level. For example, by that marker, I’m technically not a woman since I’ve lost my capacity to beget a child because of my shiny new birth control implant (tho to be fair I could be an infertile Unwoman by my own merits, but I have no interest in experimenting with that). Nulligravida FTW

            But really, this is a smaller instance of the larger problem within Christianity. If you’re only giving the people the choices to be anti-gay or not be a Real Christian(TM), plenty of people, esp Gen Z folk, are just gonna leave. Within fifty or so years, the majority of churches to survive will be the ones okay with the gays. Just like what’s happened with the churches against race-mixing.

            • Brennan McPherson says:

              Sex organs don’t matter? K. Drink deep from the Kool-Aid…

              • Brennan McPherson says:

                Also, you do realize that chromosomes and sex organs actually manufacture, control, and regulate those hormones?

              • notleia says:

                They do, except when they don’t. That’s how androgen insensitivity works, that even though the chromosomes are XY, the fetal development is female due to hormonal wonkery. Cleft palates are also due to fetal development, but no one objects to modifying those.

                But you don’t identify a man or a woman on the street by looking at their genitals, because that’s rude and creepy. It’s still rude and creepy even when you do it to someone you think is trans. You identify them by the markers of dress and conduct and suchlike as made up by whatever culture you’re inhabiting at the moment. And then you have the enbys, who are deliberately trying to mess with that concept, but you work with what you have.

                And there still remains the elephant in the room, WHY is it important to know the “true” gender of any given rando? Why is it a threat if you don’t or are mistaken? Is it (dramatic sting music) SEXISM?
                TERFs very often hold gender essentialist views about how “men” are dangerous to women even after transition because chromosomes make men innately more violent shits. More nuanced TERFs claim that people socialized as men are become and stay more violent shits, but that kinda misses the boat because the “boys” who do transition are the ones who are bullied for being not gender conforming and sissies and all.

              • Brennan McPherson says:

                If that’s sexism, every 2 year old on planet earth is sexist. Human brains are designed to make distinctions and associations.

                So, this is your argument: because a disease exists which could affect 2 to 5 per 100,000 people who are genetically male (2-5 of roughly every 200,000 people, or 0.001%-0.0025% of people), therefore, biological sex isn’t real? That’s like saying because cleft palates exist, normal mouths aren’t real–or at least certainly aren’t any different from cleft palates.

                In addition, you’re implying that they should transition to match their chromosomes, yet chromosomes don’t matter? …Can I insert a Princess Bride gif here?

                Also, androgen insensitivity is the result of a damaged chromosome. How else could it happen, except through damaged DNA? Everything you stated just proves that chromosomes and sexual organs are the ones calling the shots. How do you exchange sexual organs with someone of the opposite gender?

                I totally get that in the case of androgen insensitivity, there’s legit confusion. But saying someone who’s genetically male, and who has a penis and testicles (and no female sexual organs), yet who took a bunch of hormones, is female, flies in the face of science, reason, and reality. I understand it when people say, “I identify as female.” But it’s insanity to say that someone is being an asshole by believing, “You have a penis and are genetically male, therefore you are male.” You want subjective reality for yourself and for trans people, but not for people who believe differently. No, they’re objectively bad. Is there a song we could sing that celebrates hypocrisy?

                So, it’s not important for hospitals, government programs, etc. to know the gender of randos? If it’s not an important distinction, I clap for you, because you’ve rendered all your “men suck” remarks impotent.

                Hope the Kool-Aid tastes wonderful all summer long.

              • notleia says:

                Hospitals have legit reasons to know, and maybe the gov’t (given that discrimination against trans peeps was ruled as illegal based on discrimination against sex). Do you, as a rando on the street, have a need to know about the genitals of another rando on the street?

                Man, this is like listening to someone defend sumptuary laws because isn’t it DISGUSTING when middle-class losers wear velvet and crimson to trick people into thinking they’re a respectable peer? Doesn’t even a child know that money is no substitute for lineage?

              • You’re the one who said it was about me knowing people’s genitalia. Not me.

                Remember, this is actually about people hating someone because they affirm that biological sex is real. Which is literally just an affirmation of reality.

                Listening to you set up straw-men and knock them down with internally inconsistent logic is like watching a blind man box stuffed animals.

                Doesn’t even a child know boys have different parts from girls?

              • notleia says:

                You’re slinging a lot of insults without a lot of actual argument behind it.

                It’s NOT just a question about differences between boys and girls. This is about the unspoken assumptions being Trojan horsed behind it.

              • My argument: biological sex is real, and saying that is not hate speech.

              • Also, it’s interesting to me that when I copy/paste your own words and adjust it to apply to you, you complain about being insulted. And when I point out repeatedly that you fail to provide proper arguments, you complain about me not giving a whole lot of actual argument.

                Although I suppose the Kool-Aid thing was an unnecessary add.

              • Travis Perry says:

                Actually dress and hair assist identifying genders. Body size, facial hair, voice deepness, hip-to-waist ratio, the presence or non-presence of breasts are usually reliable indicators of biological gender. Humans in general (I’m willing to accept some rare exceptions), are hard-wired to see gender.

                Cultures accentuate natural gender differences for sexual selection reasons–not as evil conspiracy from the patriarchy from before the dawn of human history.

                Gender is important to societies. Unlike your earlier assertion, reproduction may not be important to individuals, but arguably it is the single most important thing that a society does. It is vitally important for the continued existence of any society prior to our own that men and women can identify potential mates for the purpose of making new human beings that are absolutely essential for any culture to continue existing.

                Gender is important in more ways than that–all traditional societies–ALL of them, even the matrilineal ones, break up labor by gender and have men in more dangerous tasks than women raising infants. Even the societies that have had female warriors did not expect mothers with small children to fight.

                Only modern humans, who are in some ways incredibly arrogant and ignorant when it comes to understanding societies of the past, have actually imagined that biological gender is absolutely non-essential. (Not even gender-bending people of the past asserted that gender wasn’t important at all–not that I know of.)

    • E. Stephen Burnett says:

      And this is also the free market in action, pushing back and saying that this kind of cancel culture must be opposed. 🙂

      • notleia says:

        Of course. It’s a separate question whether your portion of the market is large and/or convincing enough to counter the backlash against Rowling.
        Honestly, I don’t know why “cancel culture” has become such a scaremongering phrase when it’s not really any different than your run-of-the-mill boycott, just with more Twitter involved.

        • Um… it’s way different. Boycotting doesn’t get people directly fired. And boycotting is stupid on its own.

          • notleia says:

            As in the Karens and man-Karens who get fired for their jobs for going viral as a butthole? I’d argue that it was their butthole behavior that got them fired.

            • Brennan McPherson says:

              Lol… you’re just trying to hand-waive reality away. Which is that people got fired for having an unpopular opinion. As soon as your opinion became unpopular and you got fired for it, you’d be crying about injustice.

              • notleia says:

                You’re trying very, very hard to conflate being an asshole with “having different opinions.” Is there a reason?

                Oh BTW, why don’t you think that boycotting doesn’t work? It seems like success rates would depend on faction size and the availability of other alternate options.

              • Brennan McPherson says:

                Why are you trying very, very hard to conflate having a different opinion with being an asshole?

                Go back and re-read what I said. I didn’t say it doesn’t work. I said it’s stupid. Boycotting is about not buying a product. Not using services. Cancel culture goes much further and tries to get people fired, etc.

              • notleia says:

                Why is it stupid then? If you have a choice between comparable products, and one is made or sold by cretins like Jeff Bezos, why not choose a working product that doesn’t have the baggage of a cretin attached?

              • It’s stupid as a movement/statement. Virtually every large business has people in it that are losers and have opinions I think are reprehensible. It never stops. Which is the exact problem with Cancel Culture. You get someone fired because they believe differently from you? On something that’s actually backed by science? K.

          • notleia says:

            Oh, I just remembered the tiki-torch Nazis. Should the tiki-torch Nazis not have been fired from their companies?

  11. Leanna says:

    Jo’s essay is cogent and kind in tone but she cites incorrect numbers and the only research she explicitly mentions had blatant bias. She’s working from faulty information regardless of how well intended she is.
    Also, all hubbub about free speech seems overblown to me considering no one with power has done anything to muffle or silence Jo. And, yeah, boycotts on books usually help them sell more so…?

    On a tangential note, anyone have an actual argument to make sense of the bathroom fears thing? The “women” sign on a door has never prevented assault, rape or murder to the best of my knowledge. It’s not like it’s a magical talisman. Women go to the bathroom in groups for a reason. Because predators don’t need a “trans excuse” to take advantage of a single exit room if they have the opportunity. And it makes a lot more sense to stop a dude from following a woman into a bathroom because his behaviour is threatening than because he has a penis.

    • Travis Perry says:

      Bathroom fears? Glad you asked.

      So let’s quickly lay out a few unpopular realities. 1. Most so-called trans women still look substantially like men. Of course not all do. But many are taller than most women, have a bigger Adam’s apple, have bigger feet, have remnants of facial hair, etc that make them identifiable as someone born with an XY chromosome. 2. A man who decided to put on women’s clothing, not because he was trans, but because he wanted to be a pervert with women, could simply claim he was trans if confronted for perving. 3. Currently, those who “look like men in women’s clothing” run the risk of being confronted by women in the bathroom, having their right to be there challenged, some police officer being called, and the offending XY chromosome-carrier getting arrested. So now, they mostly stay away from the inside of the bathroom (though yes, they could be outside it, as you say). 4. Therefore letting “trans women” into women’s bathrooms opens to the door of women’s bathrooms (and locker rooms) to any male pervert willing to put on a dress and claim he is trans. Don’t think for a second there aren’t men who would do that–there are.

      Does that increase risk to women? Potentially yes. Possibly very much in certain instances, though certainly not all the time. And that risk makes the act of using a public restroom or locker room more frightening for women. Is it more likely a trans person will be in there than a dangerous man pretending to be trans? I’d say it’s more likely the mannish-looking person next to a woman in the bathroom most likely isn’t a threat. But you can’t know for sure.

      There’s another issue though, a deeper one–our bathroom-and-locker-room society was built on the assumption you could get in a state of undress without someone potentially being attracted to you while you do it. You could just do your business of changing or whatever and would not have to worry about ogling or getting propositioned (assuming you are person who doesn’t want that) at a time you feel vulnerable.

      Our culture, which is heading in the direction of pansexuality, is the real thing that kills that notion. One can easily be ogled by one’s own gender in modern times. But the fact bathrooms are segregated by natural gender still gives a veneer of safety, especially to women but also to men. The illusion that person next to you isn’t thinking sexual thoughts about you while you feel vulnerable–because that person is the same gender as you (along with the latent assumption of heterosexuality). But when the person next to you in the locker room LOOKS like a male when you’re female (or with entirely different results, looks like a female when you’re male), that strikes at the very core of why most people feel safe in using a bathroom marked for their gender but would not want to use one for the opposite gender.

      So trans identity is not like, say, racial segregation. It hits at a more basic fear. I just admitted much of the fear is actually imaginary. But not all is–and why should the majority have to give up a sense of safety to accommodate a minority?

      Wouldn’t it be better if our society moved to make all public restrooms private bathrooms and ensure locker rooms have private shower stalls? Even though that would be a pain in the neck?

    • Travis Perry says:

      Also, if you have some scientific data showing that the sudden massive increase in people identifying as a gender other than their birth in modern times has a biological basis that has always been around, please show it. Yes, I am aware of exceedingly rare and exceptional cases of hermaphrodism having a biological origin, but the number of people identifying as “trans” in modern times far, far exceeds that number…

      • Leanna says:

        Sorry, Travis, I’m really not interested in having the whole what is transgender and why does it exist rabbit hole discussion with anyone of any belief on the internet (not just you) 🙂 I think we have the same access to information so should be no real loss.

        I still think the whole bathroom fears thing is theoretical and not connected to practical reality. (I am admittedly leaving aside the locker room aspect in this) It makes so much more sense to confront someone or call police over behaviour rather than appearance. And, again, predators don’t need to dress as or call themselves women to access women’s bathrooms so why even bother with that charade?

        And I’d agree that minority vs majority makes sense if both were on a even field of discomfort. But transgender people are assaulted and murdered at much higher rates than the rest of us so it’s not level.

        • Yeah, it does deeply disturb me that transgender people get trampled. That’s why the whole bathroom thing troubles me. I think about my young daughter, and worry for her safety (because of opportunists). I also know that if men who transition are made to go to a men’s bathroom, they’ll get abused. It’s terrible.

        • Travis Perry says:

          Since my argument was for making bathrooms and locker rooms more private rather than forbidding access to bathrooms as they are now, I don’t think what I said can be accused of throwing self-identified transgender people to the wolves.

          As for you skipping the locker room aspect of this–it was wise of you to do so. There is no way most women in a public locker room will shower with someone self-identified as a transgender woman who has not transitioned physically. And they shouldn’t have to! Nor is it right of you to pooh-pooh the sense of insequirity that would cause many women. That’s actually rather heartless of you. But it’s also a natural consequence of what you are saying–so it’s incumbent on you to perhaps reconsider your thinking. Perhaps you can agree with me that private bathrooms are a more equitable solution than forcing women to have to get over what makes them feel uncomfortable.

          As for men being able to enter a woman’s bathroom now, sure, it’s possible, but the knowledge the cops will be called keeps most out. Certain people really do pretend to be what they are not to gain advantages for themselves. Apparently you’re rather innocent on the nature of human perversion. Or else are simply imagining away some hard realities. In a way, good for you, but I don’t think society can afford to be naive like that.

          Also, it was a smart move in a way to avoid posting a few links about the supposed data you referenced “proving” certain realities. Actually, good data is hard to come by on this topic and definitely does not unequivocably support your position. Feel free to do some more research for yourself and if you’re able to maintain an open mind, I believe you’ll see what I’m saying is true.

          • Leanna says:

            I’m not sure why I went searching to see if there were more comments when your reply doesn’t seem to have actually read mine. Where did I accuse you of throwing transgender people to wolves?

            Why are you assuming I’m against you? I’m interested in internet discussion on a small subsection of the topic. I have no interest in picking a fight with you or insulting your intelligence or opinions so maybe consider doing the same for me?

            I have intentionally made no claims that aren’t well known facts. Women get assaulted in bathrooms without men needing to make any excuse for being there. Transgender people have a much higher rate of assault and murder than the general population. You should have no problem finding sources for either of those facts and I have claimed nothing else. (Feel free to read through both my previous posts with a fine tooth comb)

            If you have the research, how about a citation for fear of cops calls keeping cisgender men out of women’s bathrooms?

            Maybe it would be helpful to your perception of me if I explain that I am not interested in internet discussion of any topic that requires in depth research? Chatting in limited text with strangers just isn’t worth it (for me, you may have noticed that I don’t often comment, my time is limited) when the subject is complicated emotional and important. I wasn’t intending to imply that I have already formed absolutely true beliefs on this. This seems like a lot of words for a simple point but you are a very frequent commenter so I would like to be able to have a back and forth with you without antagonism.

            I don’t know if I will check back again since my last response didn’t really get useful feedback so sorry if you lose a thoughtful response to unseen internet space.

  12. Autumn Grayson says:

    Hm…ok, I haven’t been keeping up with the details of the Rowling thing. I do know that I would disagree with her on aspects of what she says, and at the very least it’s very nearly impossible for two people to agree on every aspect of any subject. Regardless, I do hate cancel culture with a burning passion, and it can/will affect all or at least most groups. That said, this issue isn’t as simple as saying ‘Cancel Culture bad!’ and sneering at anyone that starts a cancel campaign. There are causes and effects to everything, and things that every side does wrong. If we actually want to do something about cancel culture, we need to address those causes and effects, rather than just complaining that cancellations happen. I might come back and write a post about that later, but for now here’s some videos (several from liberals) with responses against cancel culture.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4Dw8zkbwdw

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J17g6AQRmds

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6l5xfi3jvU

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbx8hdBUXzc

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zrfdq8wN2Bs

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BIYsdulTgU

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iL7uMfTLkpQ

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCJTV5KaJJc

    On this next one I’ll put the caveat that Claire Fox is somewhat mistaken about why some people participate in cancel culture. While some of it is how people are socialized to be overly cautious and feel as if words have to hurt them, there’s a lot more to it than that. Some cancel culture, outrage culture, shutting down of debate, etc is sometimes the result of actual hurt, trauma, bullying or injuries that people have experienced in the past. But her point that cancel culture is shutting down debate is still relevant. It isn’t just a liberal problem, though.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TqrahnSJCs

What do you think?